Floris Odding
Sep 7, 2018 · 2 min read

Great piece! But what do you mean with the hard problem of free will? Do you mean the hard problem of consciousness?

I really like how you remove free will out of the equation and still maintain the need for moral responsibility. I was thinking along the same lines. When I think of free will I always come back to (the illusion of) identity. When you take the analogy of a blockchain a step further, a single block is not just a block but the whole blockchain. The transactions in a block are a result of the history of the entire blockchain +new inputs. Since there is no free will and we are a product of our genes and environment, we are more than just ‘a block’.

> Instead, responsibility is shared among his or her influencers, relatives, coworkers, friends, etc. While this notion might sound radical, it is not that different from how machines are made and treated today.

I agree that with the absence of free will and the lack of awareness and consciousness in us humans we are mere action-reaction machines. But I don’t agree that the responsibility is shared among coworkers and friends since they are also mere ‘blocks’ or action-reaction machines. It’s useless to retrace the source since it goes back indefinitely.

Furthermore, it is impossible to prevent humans in developing these because a child untill the age of 6 or so is extremely ego centric and will interpret seemingly innocent behavior by adults in a way that they create beliefs like ‘I am a bad person’ or ‘I am worthless, so everything I try will fail’. What one can and should do is become aware of their own hurtful and damaging beliefs and repair them.

>Over generations, we could gradually distance ourselves from our natural and unnatural biases and constraints. Each generation could be slightly more aware and in charge of its own condition.

That’s a great conclusion. I believe this to be true as well. I have the impression that people don’t want to let go of the idea that they have a free will since the notion that they are responsible for their own succes and failure prevents them from becoming fatalistic and just laying on bed the whole day. For myself I believe in the psychological experience of free will. I don’t mind if it’s existent or not. My identity is illusionary as well, but I experience it nonetheless.

    Floris Odding

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